Chung Yeung Festival

The Chung Yeung Festival falls on the ninth day of the ninth lunar month. You can find the Western calendar date here.

Similar to the Ching Ming Festival in spring, the Chung Yeung Festival is when entire families congregate at cemeteries to engage in age-old practices of ancestor worship.

It is also popular to hike to the city’s high points on this day, as it’s believed this will bring good luck. This custom is rooted in a Han dynasty (202 BC to 220 AD) legend in which a soothsayer advised a man to take his family to high ground for the ninth day of the ninth moon. The man complied and the next day discovered that all the inhabitants of his village had been slaughtered, while he and his family had been spared by leaving for the hills.

In Hong Kong, people go to the great outdoors for a picnic on this day, with many people eating special cakes called ‘ko’. The name sounds similar to ‘high’ or ‘top’ in Chinese and people eat them in the hope of being promoted to high positions.